1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a character pattern generating apparatus. More particularly, the present invention relates to a character pattern generating apparatus having characters in an outline font and generating various character patterns with different stroke thicknesses.
2. Description of the Related Arts
Examples of the above character pattern generating apparatus include one for generating characters with thick character patterns or thin character patterns. Such a character generating apparatus is disclosed, for example, in Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication (Kokai) No. Hei 4(1992)-24689, in which a series of points constituting the outline of the character are shifted by a predetermined length toward the inside or outside of the outline in a direction perpendicular to the gradient of the outline at each of the points.
Also, Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication (Kokai) No. Hei 4(1992)-136898 discloses a method characterized by adding to the data approximating the outline of the character with a line/curve an attribute corresponding to the state of the approximating line/curve and by altering the line width of the stroke and partially changing the outline shape through utilizing the added attribute.
However, according to the above methods disclosed in Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication (Kokai) No. Hei 4(1992)-24689 or Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication (Kokai) No. Hei 4(1992)-136898, a complicated procedure including calculation of angles is required in transferring each of the outline points, leading to large amount of calculation. Moreover, since the amount of shift is constant, thick portions or thin portions of the stroke originally present in the designed characters become monotonous, thus deteriorating the quality. In addition, it is necessary to add deformation correction data such as the direction and the amount of shift for each of the outline points, so that the number of steps for adding the data and the amount of font data will be large.
Further, a conventional character pattern generating apparatus such as disclosed in Japanese Examined Patent Publication (Kokoku) No. Hei 8(1996)-12544 stores data on character shape described in line figure showing skeleton of character figure and outline shape of fundamental elements constituting the character style of the character figure as a plurality of parameters, and generates a character figure by modifying and combining the shape of the constituent element for each character kind based on the data of the character shape.
However, this method of storing the data of the shape of the constituent element as a plurality of element parameters forming the outline needs a professional knowledge of the element parameters and the registration operations in order to design and register these parameters. Therefore, it was difficult for those without the professional knowledge of character style designer, for example to modify these constituent elements.
Also, in these methods, numerous modifications were needed on the shapes such as bent portions or squamiform (scale-like) portions of the characters so as to maintain the quality of the characters in a character style.